First Student Respond
1) You are absolutely right, but I would also add some detail to your definition – high level processing involves activities which contribute to the co-construction of knowledge (elaborating, speculating, providing justification, making inferences, making connections, asking thought-provoking questions, etc.), which is different from just sharing the information or exchanging ideas. I believe it is an important aspect. Besides, it is initiated by indirect questions and uncertain statements.
2) I can agree with you, really, students of other ages can manage this task and reach high-level co-regulation, too. There can be different in their knowledge or skills, but it doesn’t depend on the age much, it is rather individual to a person. However, I am not sure that everyone can reach a collaborative learning stage at the first meeting; they would rather need at least two.
3) You are quite right, the main factors contributing to successful collaborative learning are: questions, uncertain (i.e., open) statements, task-relevant background knowledge and positive emotions.
Second Student respond
I can agree with you that the term “co-regulation” is supposed to encompass several concepts at once, i.e. “collaboration”, “co-constructing meaning,” but group work solely does not guarantee efficient collaborative learning with high-level co-regulation. But “shared knowledge” is stated in the article as the mode of co-regulation, together with “other regulation”, so co-regulation is a broader notion than “shared knowledge”.
As for tentativeness, it is really interesting for me, too. It is a bit surprising that lacking certainty and self-reliance can improve the group-work, but actually it is so. If some student takes the initiative and asserts that his opinion is the only possible variant, the conversation gets stuck and may end on the wrong stage, when the consensus and the truth are not found yet.
Third Student Respond
I believe your ideas about social communication and helping one another are very interesting and related to the topic under discussion. Really, group work presented in the article is a fascinating example of students who already have enough background knowledge to omit some simpler discussions, but who are helping one another to find the solution in the complex system of the case they are studying. This situation can be shifted to another group of children or adults with certain changes – children will have simpler tasks and less background knowledge, while adults may have a more interesting conversation, but they might be difficult to stay tentative and ask uncertain questions, having much more experience.
Forth Student Respond
I think, if students do not have enough background knowledge to start co-constructing meaning, they will need some more time to achieve a high-level collaboration, but it is still possible. They may also study the information beforehand at home, but still they will need some time in class to make sure that they understand the case and the basic things. As soon as they reach a common understanding, they can go to higher levels.
I am not sure that I understand your opinion about 9 and 10-year-old children because you just differentiated between the low-level and high-level collaboration. For example, in my opinion, even younger pupils and students can also have a high-level collaborative learning, with some differences, of course – e.g., simpler topics or more positive emotions.
